“We laid seven cages around the village and trapped the big cat. But angry locals came with cans of fuel and torched the cage with the big cat inside. Forest officials guarding the cage where shooed away,” he said.

There have been several instances of man-animal conflict in India in recent years.

Alarming

In July, a group of men killed a leopard with sticks and stones in Gujarat’s Rojmal village.

With 1,395 leopards, Gujarat has the second highest population of the cats in the country. More than a third of these cats live close to human habitation.

Last year, more than a dozen people, mostly farm workers, were killed and over 100 were injured in leopard attacks.

In many villages of Gujarat, people light small fires while working on fields to keep the cats away.

A great deal of the landscape is protected and also, for a location of such small percentages, there is a significant proportion of nature gets, wildlife shelters as well as man-made parks and gardens.